The institution includes the traditional Church Music Institute founded in 1919 by Karl Straube (1873–1950). The music school was renamed ″Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy″ after its founder in 1972. In the year 1992 the Hans Otto Drama School of Leipzig, Germany's oldest drama school, became part of the college.

The university of music and theater is one of 365 places chosen in 2009 by the Cabinet of Germany and the Office of the Representative of German Industry and Trade for the campaign Germany - Land of Ideas.

The music school's home was in the first Gewandhaus (in the Gewandgäßchen/Universitätsstraße street at the city center, today the city's department store is based there). The musicians of the Orchestra were obligated to act as teaching staff, a tradition that was unbroken until German reunification in 1990.

College Hall 1900

In 1876 the school got permission to change its name to Königliches Konservatorium der Musik zu Leipzig, Royal Conservatory of Music of Leipzig. The new premises at Grassistraße 8 were inaugurated on December 5, 1887. They were built 1885-1887 by the architect Hugo Licht (1841–1923) in the music quarter of Leipzig, south-west of the city center. The benefactor was the pathologist Justus Radius (1797–1884).

Not until 1924 was the Royal Conservatory renamed into Landeskonservatorium der Musik zu Leipzig, six years after the fall of the Kingdom of Saxony.

Staircase at the Grassistraße

In the summer term of 1938 343 male students were enrolled at the Landeskonservatorium. This made the Conservatory the fourth biggest music school in the German Reich after the Universität der Künste Berlin (633 students), the music school of Cologne (406 students) and the school for music and theater of Munich (404 students).

The Austrian composer Johann Nepomuk David (1895–1977) was the school's director from 1939 until 1945.

The school was again renamed June 8, 1941 to Staatliche Hochschule für Musik, Musikerziehung und darstellende Kunst, Public College for music, musical education and performing arts. In 1944 the school remained closed due to the Second World War.

Once again, the school was renamed October 1, 1946 to Mendelssohn Academy and November 4, 1972, on the occasion of its founders name, to Hochschule für Musik Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy, Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy College of Music.

The Saxon University Constitution Law (Sächsische Hochschulstrukturgesetz) of April 10, 1992 confirmed the College of Music to Leipzig and expanded it with the annexation of the Hans Otto College of Theatre (Germany's first College of Theatre) to form the Hochschule für Musik und Theater Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy : the Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy College of Music and Theatre.

The new Great Hall was inaugurated 2001 and 2004 awarded by the Bund Deutscher Architekten,[1] a German architects union. The college's second premises were opened 2002 and there's an orchestra academy in co-operation with the Gewandhausorchestra since 2004 in order to support top musicians.

The Institute of Church Music (Kirchenmusikalische Institut) was refounded 1992. The Institute has a prominent role in Germany because of Max Reger (1873–1916), Kurt Thomas (1904–1973) and Günther Ramin (1898–1956). It offers programs in church music, chorus conduction and organ. It offers research masters in those subjects as well.

The Institute of Church Music was founded by Karl Straube (1873–1950) in 1921 and 1926 it became part of the Saxon Evangelical-Lutheran Church.

Since 1999 the school is adapting to the Bologna process. As of 2008 the adjustment to the Bachelor's degree and Master's degree system is being organized. The education program with major in school music is since the winter term of 2006/07 already adapted to the Bologna process and as such leads to a Bachelor's degree. The programs of the Institute of Church Music were changed to the beginning of the winter term 2008/09 and until the winter term of 1010/2011 all programs have to be adapted to the Bologna process.[5]

A total of 813 students were enrolled at the College in 2007 (375 males and 438 females). There were 260 (32%) international students enrolled at the time.[6] They come above all from Poland, Russia, South Korea and China.[7] Thirteen of them are scholarship holders of the German Academic Exchange Service, this makes the school the best one on the scholarship holders list out of every German Music Colleges.[8]

The Felix Mendelssohn College of Music and Theatre organizes many music contests. The Lions-Club Leipzig hosts the Albert-Lortzing-Förderpreis Singing Contest with a €2,500 prize. Furthermore the college organizes a contest for ensembles and the recognized Young Concert Artists European Auditions together with the Young Concert Artists (YCA), New York.[9] The school leads among all German colleges of music with a total of 470 public events yearly.[10]